Excerpt

Moons' Dancing

Book 2 of "Children of the Rock"
byMarguerite Krause & Susan Sizemore

(From Five Star Speculative Fiction - December 2003)

Chapter One

"What are you doing?"

"Hush," Jordy whispered.

Vray hushed. In the three days since they left Broadford,
she had already learned quite a bit about what it meant to be
a carter on the road. Jordy and Tob had a well-rehearsed yet flexible
routine for each day's activities. Since bringing Tob on his summer's
journeys had effectively halved Jordy's work load, he claimed
that adding another helper should make things even easier. He'd
insisted on one and only one firm rule of behavior. When he spoke,
Tob and Vray were to obey immediately. He would answer their questions,
argue with them, and otherwise treat them as responsible young
adults most of the time but at moments of decision, his had to
be the only voice.

Tob looked around from unharnessing Stockings. The
sun was low in the west, about to disappear behind the distant
purple mass on the horizon that marked the beginning of the Dherrican
mountains. Jordy, standing beside the wagon's front wheel, had
reached under the driver's seat and pulled out a stone. His manner
did not suggest danger, but Vray stopped rummaging in the back
of the wagon for firewood and apprehensively tried to locate whatever
had attracted the carter's attention.

Around them stretched mile after mile of gently
rolling Atowa grassland. They had been crossing the almost featureless
plateau for two days. Two days of similar travel remained before
they reached the southern shore of Lake Hari. The road to the
north was empty, straight and unvarying all the way to the horizon.
Just visible where the road passed over the southern horizon was
the clump of pale green trees that marked the location of the
little spring-fed pond at which they'd filled their water casks.
A similar cluster of trees was visible a few miles to the east
of the road. With those exceptions, the expanse of new grass was
unbroken. Vray could see no travelers other than themselves, no
startled flocks of birds or fleeing herds of antelope that might
warn of a pack of jackals, or worse still, a hunting phantom cat.

Jordy's attention was on a gentle slope less than
a dozen yards from the wagon. He held the stone in his right hand,
arm half-cocked. Vray, standing above and behind him in the bed
of the wagon, had a fleeting glimpse of brown fur and tall ears
before he threw. The little animal rolled over several times under
the impact. Jordy turned at once, produced two more stones from
under the wagon seat, and trotted up the slope.

Recognition came belatedly to Vray. "That was
a rabbit!" she exclaimed.

"Shhh," Tob warned her. "There may
be more."

Jordy crouched down as he neared the top of the
slope, then threw his remaining two stones one after another,
almost more quickly than Vray's eye could follow. He straightened
and disappeared briefly over the top of the hillock.

"Your mouth's open, Iris," Tob teased
her gently.

Vray recovered her dropped jaw and walked toward
Tob. "He's fast."

The comment was inadequate, but she wasn't ready
to try to explain the deeper layers of her unease. Every time
she thought she had a firm grasp of just what the carter was capable
of, he turned around and did something unexpected. It wasn't that
she hadn't expected Jordy to be a skillful hunter. She knew his
skill with a bow. However, for a few seconds, his intensity had
made her expect danger rather than dinner.

He's only a carter, she reminded herself
sternly. He and his friends might be plotting revolution, training
the villagers to fight, but that didn't mean he knew the first
thing about actually confronting a troop of Damon's guards. By
the Firstmother, today's kills were only rabbits!

Jordy came down the slope toward them, two rabbits
in one hand and one in the other; a satisfied half-smile on his
face. Vray, annoyed with him for making her uneasy, folded her
arms over her chest.

"I thought that's what the bow was for,"
she said, inclining her head toward the back of the wagon.

"That great thing for a beastie this size?
Half the meat would be ripped away. Besides, it wasn't handy.
That's why I keep throwing stones here." He lay the rabbits
on the wagon seat, then reached underneath. With a sharp tug he
slid out an entire tray of slightly jagged, palm-fitting stones.
He looked over Vray's shoulder at Tob. "That reminds me,
we saw grouse near here last summer, didn't we?"

"Half-way home from Edian? Yes, I think that
was the night."

"I'll have a look. A bird or two will make
a good lunch tomorrow." He slipped a few stones into his
pockets. "Be sure to set up the tent. The wind's turning
to the north, and that means rain. I'll be back in an hour."

"Right, Dad," Tob replied.

Jordy left. Vray returned to the wagon and gathered
a bundle of firewood in to her arms. She found the patch of bare,
red-brown soil that marked the location of previous travelers'
campfires and laid her wood beside it. Then she returned to the
wagon for the cooking gear. Tob led Stockings out into the grass
and hobbled her. Vray expected him to go around to the back of
the wagon and begin unpacking the tent. Instead, he took the pack
full of pots and utensils away from her, set it on the ground,
and wrapped his arms around her. Vray responded willingly enough
with a kiss. When she came up for air, however, he wouldn't let
her go.

"Tob," she said. "We're supposed
to be setting up camp."

"We've got plenty of time." He kissed
the end of her nose, then began nibbling lightly over her cheek.

Vray pushed against his chest and tried to glare
at him. "Approves of us? Of you and me together, us?"

"Sure."

"You told him?"

Tob finally reacted to the astonishment in her voice
and paused in his caresses. "He asked. Actually, he guessed
the morning after the Festival that I'd been with you." A
blush reddened his already sun-darkened cheeks. "He said
what I'd been doing was obvious."

"Mothers," Vray muttered. She cleared
her throat. "He didn't mind?"

"Why should he? He's proud of you, Iris. I've
heard him say so to Herri. The whole village likes you. You were
pretty strange when you came to us last summer, but you've gotten
a lot better." A hint of worry darkened the earnest blue
eyes. "He knows I didn't just take advantage of you. I never
would have suggested it, if you didn't really know what we were
doing!"

That shattering sound, Vray told herself,
is the collapse of my sense of self-importance. She had
entertained doubts about the fairness of seducing an innocent
Keeper boy. She had never thought to consider that Tob and Jordy
might be concerned about her innocence. She took a deep breath.
"Of course you'd never do that, Tob."

His smirk returned. "You're not embarrassed,
are you? I suppose I could have said it was someone else, but
Dad says trying to keep secrets only complicates life sooner or
later."

"I'm not embarrassed." She fidgeted thoughtfully
with the embroidery on the front of his tunic. "But, isn't
it a little awkward? For Dad, I mean? With Mama being all the
way back in Broadford, I mean."

Tob took her hands away from his shirt and slid
them around his waist. "That's why we should do it now, while
he's not here." He covered her mouth with his.

The kiss lasted a long time. When they stopped,
Vray allowed her concern one last expression. "He'll know,"
she murmured against Tob's throat.

With one hand he released the nearest tarp from
the back of the wagon. A flip of his arm shook it open. It was
still settling to the ground as Tob lowered her onto it, the grass
a soft mat beneath them. "He won't mention it if we don't."

The words freed Vray, and she reached out for the
drawstring on Tob's trousers.

# # #

A glaring yellow pine cone the size of a small mountain
skimmed gracefully through pink froth air. Aage did not interfere.
A few ninedays passed; the moons zigzagging absurdly overhead.
Aage left his head where it was and carried another with him to the top of the wall. Below,a few trout grinned at him, fangs glinting in the light of a nearby greenish star. Again he turned away. He knew them. They were rarely
dangerous and never effective. Without eyes, he looked elsewhere
for a threat. Without ears, he listened to babble rising and falling,
approaching and receding. A flock of three-legged horses tumbled
end over end in the distance.

Direct threat. Aage bent the power sharply,
losing as he did so the odd images his mind produced when he wasn't
busy. There was only the world; fragile sphere suspended in night,
enclosed in its protective web. Only himself, one strand pulsing
with power. Only the Others, making yet another attempt to snatch
the web and tear it away.

Aage fought, his concentration pure, effortless.
He never spoke of what he did, even to Morb. When Morb was present
with him, no discussion was necessary. Later, when they resumed
their bodies, no discussion was possible. At least not for Aage.
He suspected that Morb, with his centuries of experience, was
no longer troubled by a need to conceptualize what he experienced
in physical terms. He never encountered bizarrely shaped sheep
or clouds of shouting porridge.

Of course, he never heard the gods, either.

Aage became aware of their presence as his struggle
with the Others reached its peak. They did not come every time
he entered the realms of power, but they always came in the midst
of battle. The first time he became aware of them he had thought
them another hallucination, another distorted product of his mind's
attempt to translate the totally alien into familiar terms. He
quickly learned that the gods did not appreciate being dismissed
out of hand.

He'd been taught that the gods spoke to certain
Dreamers, especially at moments of crisis. Until it happened,
he had never imagined it would happen to him. The other Dreamers,
however, had gratefully accepted his messages from the gods. Soon
he, too, was able to view the occasional communications as simply
another manifestation of his power-bending gifts.

He continued to put all his energy into his struggle
with the Others. In effect, he became two people: one, a wizard
wielding magic against monsters; the second, a very normal, very
flesh and blood Child of the Rock. The gods' presence was the
warmth of friends standing close beside him on a cool evening.

Then he saw the vision. The ledge outside Morb's
cave. Evening. Hot, sticky, mid-summer. Golden Keyn-light revealed
glistening perspiration on Morb's brown shoulders as he seated
himself on his boulder. The power was surging with dangerous intensity.
All three of the Dreamers on the ledge were aware of it.

Aage watched the third Dreamer duck into Morb's
cave to fill his bowl with water. His. Not one of the Greenmothers.
Another male Dreamer. A new Dreamer!

Aage waited eagerly for the young wizard to emerge.
Who was he? He'd glimpsed dark hair. Not Forrit, then. Unless
the blond Sitrinian boy was going to darken unexpectedly as he
matured. As quickly as he thought it, he dismissed the idea. His
vision-self knew this new Dreamer, knew he wasn't Forrit.

The vision faded. A mood lingered, reassurance and
warning combined. This Dreamer's gifts were strong. He would bend
the power, hold off intruders as well as, perhaps better than,
Morb himself. The warning was that his strength would be needed.
Dangers lay ahead.

Before the gods could recede, Aage called out wordlessly.
Why do you show this Dreamer to me? Who will he be? Will he
need special attention to reach that moment on Morb's ledge?

He will be there. You will be with him.

Who is he?

Present generation Dreamer child.

Aage's adversary was in retreat. With one part of
himself, he bent the power to end the battle. Another part strained
to retain awareness of the gods. Please. Who is he? Which of
the chosen Keepers' and Shapers' children?

There was no immediate answer. A shiver of protest
prickled at the back of his awareness. Not Damon!

Danger. In the instant that he completed
his battle, another attack began. Aage's senses whirled as he
made the transition from offense to defense. He had to abandon
his interrogation of the gods. Visions of the future would serve
no purpose if he allowed the world to be destroyed in the present.

The initial onslaught was fierce, but this Other
lacked perseverance. Aage bent the power with more confidence.
He pushed harder; the Other began to collapse. Then, even more
abruptly than before, it swelled, doubled, tripled its strength.
Aage narrowly evaded the trap. Once more he built his defense.

The voices came with no advance warning. He is
not a son of Damon.

Aage did not feel ready to resume the conversation,
but the gods obviously thought he was. Perhaps they knew his strength
better than he did himself. Encouraged, he shifted his place in
the power, stretching the web a bit, preparing a strategy he'd
often considered but never tried for fear of the risk. As he worked,
he addressed the gods. Whose son is he?

Yours.

A Dreamer child yes, but -

Your child, wizard.

He almost dropped the barriers he was so carefully
erecting around the intruder. My child? How my child? You made
Dreamers infertile.

Your child, wizard.

It's not possible!

Silence.

Is it?

Your child, wizard.

He tried to feel the gods' presence, gauge their
mood. Failed. More of his energy drained into the battle. My
child? he demanded. With what mother?

Silence.

What woman would have me? Not Savyea or Jenil.
They're as infertile as I am. Perhaps, when I tell them that you
said this to me

They would not approve.

I don't understand. Who could be mother to my
child? I haven't had time for a lover for three years. My only
friend is the princess

Princess.

This time the shock of disbelief worked in Aage's
favor. The burst of energy drove his adversary back. I should
have a child with Jeyn?

The Princess.

A twist in the strands of power marked Morb's arrival.
In the presence of two wizards, the assault from the other universe
collapsed. Aage knew without calling that the gods were gone,
too. Morb ordered him back to the world.

The morning sun had just cleared the peaks on the
other side of the valley. The mountains tilted. Aage's head landed
on Morb's hard shoulder. Morb's hands caught at him, preventing
him from toppling off the boulder. Odd. The old wizard's hands
seemed to be gripping some other person's body. The numbness spread
rapidly, deadening sound, dulling vision.

Morb's voice reached him, faint, distorted. "What
happened to you?"

A vision, Aage wanted to say, but he couldn't
hear his own voice. A vision I don't want to think about.